


My natural reaction is that we're scared

by mbat



Category: Half Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Demonic Possession, Demons, M/M, Multi, Paranormal, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:09:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25398940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mbat/pseuds/mbat
Summary: Benry is a little bastard who thought summoning a demon would be a good idea. It was not. Now he has to deal with the consequences, which will leave him to never be quite the same. (also it's set at college but the college part isn't very much because I don't know anything about college)Also there's gay shit because I'm gay <3The AU this fic is based off was made by https://theycuthisarmoffwhydtheydothat.tumblr.com/ !!!! please check them out they're such a sweetie and have wonderful ideas yes!Lastly this is my first fic that I've posted on AO3 and also the longest one I think I've written to date... so please be patient with me ^^;
Relationships: Benrey & Gordon Freeman, Benrey & Tommy Coolatta, Benrey/Gordon Freeman, Benrey/Tommy Coolatta, Tommy Coolatta & Gordon Freeman, Tommy Coolatta & Sunkist
Comments: 3
Kudos: 57





	1. 1. It was supposed to be fun.

**Author's Note:**

> The first few chapter (1-5) were prewritten before I posted this but everything after isn't going to be here as instantly!! please don't rush me ^^;

It was just a nice evening in the college courtyard, Gordon and Tommy just doing their work, Benry staring at his phone, and Sunkist lying peacefully next to the table they were all at.

“This is lame.” Benry broke the near silence to say, making the sound of pencils writing pause around him.

“You can go back to our dorm anytime, man. Tommy and I need to finish this.” Gordon spoke with monotone irritation. He continued his writing, but Tommy hesitated for a second, thinking.

“This is really boring and we do still have a few days on this….we should do something fun!” He put his pencil down and looked between the other two with bright eyes. Benry pulled a small grin. Gordon sighed, two against one.

“Fine, you two have any ideas?” He also put down his pencil, looking up at Benry.

He grinned a bit bigger, he knew exactly what he wanted to try.

“We should summon a demon!” He said, a bit too loudly, as someone walked by. It was one of the professors, Dr. Coomer. He stopped his walking and turned to the boys, Tommy smiled at Coomer and Gordon laid his face on the table in frustration, Benry hadn’t yet noticed.

“Huh?”

“Did you say summon a demon? That's very dangerous boys, you shouldn't try to do that!” he walked up to the table, catching Benrys attention as he stood right next to him. Benry turned, having been sitting sideways in the chair, to sit normally. 

“Come on bro, it's not like it would even work, it's just fun.” Benry put his phone down and looked at the other two, who had been silent. Gordon still had his head on the table and Tommy looked nervous.

“It can work if you’re doing the real thing, you could get seriously hurt! Not to mention set the campus on fire!” He smiled as he spoke, but his words were a warning.

“I wasn’t planning on doing ‘the real thing’ though, just these stupid ones man, see?” He held the phone up for Coomer, showing the typical dumb fake techniques. “Plus we can’t be the first people on this campus to do this.”

Coomer thought for a moment, looking at the phone.

“...Fine, but I'm going to supervise you!” he spoke cheerily, leaving Benry with a twinge of irritation that he easily squashed. Gordon however sucked at squashing irritation.

“We should just go to sleep, dude! Or let me finish my work, I’m not going to be dumb enough to try and summon a demon, especially with one of the teachers! no offense Dr. Coomer.” Gordons voice was filled with irritation.

“None taken, Gordon!”

“Come on bro, this could be super fuuuuun.” Benry leaned forward toward Gordon, his face getting close to the other over the small table space. Gordon groaned a bit and stuck his tongue out at Benry. 

The group turned to Tommy, silently expecting the vote to be fulfilled. He shrunk under all the eyes, clearly not going to answer under these conditions. His peers instantly understood, the professor took a moment.

"What's your pick, Tommy?" Gordon said softly, looking at Benry instead. He stuck his tongue out again and Benry did the same, grinning.

"I mean….if we have Dr. Coomer to watch over us….I think we should!" He quickly went back to cheery. 

Gordon groaned and turned his face to be entirely facing the table, covering his head with his arms.

\-- --

Sunkist wagged her tail unaware of what was happening around her, but joyful nonetheless.

Tommy walked next to her, also joyful as he usually was. In front of him walked Benry whose arms and hoodie pocket were full of various items for their plans. Pencils and papers and a few candles, and some more. Gordon walked in between them with his arms crossed, near grumbling like some cranky old man.

They arrived at their current destination, Dr. Coomers classroom, and so they opened the door.

Coomer was at one of the tables talking softly to another man, who was similar in age. He looked up at the men walking in. 

"Ah, Hello boys! I don't think any of you have yet met my husband, Dr. Bubby!" he gestured to the other man, who turned to the group, a strange look on his face. 

"Yes hello, why are we doing this?" he turned to his husband again, folding his hands on the table.

Coomer explained to him softly, while the boys walked toward them. Coomer and Bubby stood up, making the rest of them stop in their tracks.

"We clearly aren't going to do any of this here in my classroom, or any of these classrooms!" he walked around the group to the door, signaling that they follow. 

As they got back into the hall, Coomer continued to speak, holding hands with Bubby.

"Y'see boys, there's an area of this campus that's empty, it's perfect! they were supposed to put more classes there years ago, but they never did!"

They kept turning corners and walking, even switching buildings once or twice. By the time they reached the right area, you could feel the cold, dusty air of the building like it was a shirt.

Into a fair-sized classroom they went, the only items in the room being a few chairs, a table, and a box of chalk for the chalkboard. A single window illuminated the room bright enough to see from the lamp outside.

A clock on the wall showed that it was getting awfully late.

Benry was the first to sit, sitting on the dusty ass floor and dropping everything carelessly onto it. pencils rolled and so did the candles.

Gordon just about tripped on one of the candles as he went to grab one of the chairs. He glared at it and then lightly kicked it back toward Benry, who dramatically fell onto the floor as it hit his thigh. Sunkist curiously sniffed and licked at his face as he pretended to die, and he couldn't help himself as he started smiling and even giggling a little.

Tommy gladly sat next to Sunkist and Benry as the two older men grabbed chairs and finished the circle. Gordon begrudgingly picked up all the stuff that Benry had dropped, placing it all in the center of the circle.

Benry lit the candles in a circle, and the others made sure it was in a safe way, Tommy got Sunkist to move out of the circle and behind Benry.

They proceeded to play a few of the typical crappy games, Benry had even made a purposefully shitty recreation of the ouija board, along with a vaguely phallic-shaped planchette, Tommy and the couple not really noticing, but Gordon threw him a look when he saw it.

He also continued to mess with Gordon by moving the planchette to random letters or dumb words, even at one point making it spell out "FEET", earning him a fun groan and facepalm from Gordon, who said they should move on.

The two oldest had been talking quietly to each other the whole time, pretty chill and tiredly. It was less chill when Benry asked if there was a mirror nearby.

"That’s a stupid idea, that crosses the line between dumb kids games and actual paranormal shit," Bubby said, maybe a bit too rudely, though it didn’t faze Benry.

"What, chanting at a mirror is gonna kill me? It's just glass man." He replied, poking Gordons shoulder with the vaguely phallic paper planchette, Gordon just trying to pet Sunkist behind Benry. 

Bubby looked ready to say more rude things when Coomer cut him off, talking instead. 

"A mirror can be an easy window into the soul, Benry! Sure, it's normally harmless, but the right words and actions can get very dangerous! It's better to just leave it alone. Plus, there are no mirrors around here anyway."

That was clearly a lie, there were bathrooms only down the hall and they always had mirrors, but Benry didn't feel like getting up to walk that much anyway.

He looked over to Gordon about to talk to him when he realized Gordon was looking at the clock, looking tired. It read 3:25 AM. He saw the others all looked tired too.

Benry felt a twinge of guilt, but squashed it down. He had one more idea, so he pulled out his phone and looked for what he had seen before.

He found it but knew he couldn't do it with the supervisors watching over them so directly.

Benry put his arms around himself, and even scooted closer to Gordon, and looked at the old men.

“Do you think you guys could go find a thermostat or something?? It's so cold in this place.” He even clicked his teeth a bit. The men agreed, getting up to go investigate the hall for a possible thermostat.

In reality Benry wasn't cold. He was aware that it was cold in the room, but he liked the temperature just fine. He dramatically leaned all up against Gordon, just about knocking him over. Gordon didn't even respond aside from lightly shoving back at Benry.

Benry softly sighed to himself and went to grab the chalk that was against one of the walls. He sat right back in his spot. He put the chalk between him and Tommy, who was laying up against Sunkist not quite asleep, but very close. 

He grabbed a red piece and began to draw between the candles, catching Gordon’s attention for real.

“Dude what the fuck are you doing?? Please tell me you're not doing what I think you are” He went to erase some, but Benry stopped him.

“It's not going to work dude, it's just some fun. Come on, it's the last thing for tonight.” He finished the star, and went to go to make the circle.

“Those two have sounded really sure of what they're saying all night man...” Gordon sounded awfully nervous.

“Anyone who believes in this stuff always sounds super sure man, that's the whole point when someone believes something, isn't it? Doesn't make it real.” He finished the circle, and pulled out his phone to check the page again. 

He started to softly speak to himself and pull out something from his pocket. Gordon began to feel panic rise in him as Benry pulled out a small pocket knife and cut the tip to his finger, slicing it just enough to bleed. He let it drip in the center.

The two boys held their breath, Gordon about to start screaming the moment anything happened.

Benry wiped the wound on his dark pants and turned to Gordon. 

“Shit didn't even work man, I told y-'' Benry spoke monotonously, going to erase the chalk himself.

He was interrupted by Sunkist, who had been patiently silent and sleeping most of the night, growling intensely. Tommy woke abruptly and looked around in fear, going to reach toward Sunkist in an attempt to calm her and himself, but she backed away.

The room seemed to freeze in temperature, and it was made clear when Benry looked at the other two and they were shivering. Gordon even scooted up against him and tried to use him as warmth, but it wasn't much help because Benry seemed to be just as cold as the room anyway, leaving Gordon to try Tommy instead.

The room lit up in a strange reddish color as heatless fire shot from the pentagram on the floor and then got dark, turning into pure inky blackness.

It was at this point that the door burst open and Coomer and Bubby hurried in, both close together to try and combat the cold. It felt like in the chaos, the only thing that was still was Benry, who couldn't squash how horrible he felt right now.

He stared into the darkness, unable to look away as the shape of a face protruded from the bursting shadows, and eyes opened upon the face….and then dozens of more eyes opened all along with the shadows themselves, and every single one was staring right back at Benry.

The two older men were yelling and Sunkist was still growling and whimpering but everything was muffled in Benry’s mind, and everything but the shadows seemed to blur.

The demon in front of him opened its mouth, rows, and rows of sharp, jagged teeth revealing themselves, darkness dripping from its maw.

 _ **“You… perfect.”**_ It spoke, as its pure shadows poured into Benry’s eyes and mouth, a horrifying sight to the others.

But Benry couldn't feel a thing as he lost all consciousness.


	2. 2. But you can't come back from that easily.

Benry opened his eyes to darkness.

And it stayed like that for a little bit. 

But he soon felt the need to turn his head, and turned directly to large, deep eyes only inches from his own. It didn't really surprise him though, nor scare him. In fact, he didn't really feel anything right now.

 _ **“Look at you… you look like nothing”**_ It spoke, sounding like it was smiling, but this time it had no mouth. Only a large pair of eyes.

It began to spin around him, looking closely at every detail of him. Benry didn't really bother to protest or move, he just stood there.

It stopped right in front of his face again, looking right into his soul.

 _ **“Couldn't be more perfect than you.... You're already barely human in the first place. Not to mention…. Yesssss, you're just perfect.”**_

“Not to mention wha?” Benry spoke softly, staring right back into it.

_**“Please, you know what they say.”** _

“Nah man, I don't.” 

It laughed, amused by him.

_**“I know you're trying to mess with me, but you only show more why I chose you so easily. You fell into my hands so nicely.”** _

Benry didn’t care enough to continue speaking.

_**“This will be fun.”** _

Benry awoke in bed and immediately sat up, grabbing the blankets with horribly tight fists. He was hyperventilating.

There was noise next to him but he couldn't find it in himself to move his head, he felt frozen.

“Hey, hey! Dude, you have to breathe!” A voice next to him spoke softly.

He could not listen.

He felt a hand bigger than his own wrap around his, it was so warm, he liked it.

“Come on man, fuckwhatwerethenumbers, breathe in, 1, 2, 3, 4… hold for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7… and then breathe out for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8…” 

They repeated this until Benry finally was breathing normally, and he looked up at Gordon with tired eyes. Gordon looked tired and concerned, still holding Benrys hand.

Benry caught sight of their clock, it read 7:42 pm. He felt so much like shit...and so….cold.

What? 

He began to shiver. He looked toward their window, darkness was the only thing on the other side of the blinds.

He pulled the blanket upward, over his chest which was somehow now bare. He never liked being shirtless, even though he had no reason to really dislike it anymore. He wrapped the blanket around himself and looked up toward Gordon again.

“Do you uh... Want to talk about what happened man?” Gordon went to reach for the nightstand, grabbing a glass of water and offering it to Benry. He accepted and drank a bit of it.

He shook his head, and asked if Gordon could grab one of his shirts, and so Gordon did. He put it on and wrapped the blanket around himself more as he walked to the bathroom, looking at himself in the mirror.

His usual eyebags were worse than before and his hair was a fucking disaster. He went to go grab the brush, though he stopped when he saw the bandaid on his finger. They really went all out on taking care of him, huh?

He brushed his hair the best he could manage, which wasn't much, his hair barely wanted to work with him on a good day, the curls sucked. He always put a chullo over it anyway.

He continued to look at his face in the mirror, and also just close his eyes for a bit cause he was so….tired. This sucked, people felt like this all the time??

He opened his eyes back up, and tried to pull a smile, though it looked as forced as it obviously was. He let his face fall right back into neutral, though his reflection didn't follow.

It continued to smile. The grin twisting and the eyes splitting into more eyes.

It took him a moment to react, but when he did he jumped back and hit his head on the wall of the tiny bathroom, and then sat on the floor, holding his hands to his head and surrounding himself in the blanket.

Gordon arrived at the already open door, concerned and fearful.

“Dude are you okay?? What just happened??” He kneeled down next to the mound of blanket, attempting to put his hand on Benrys shoulder, but it was unclear where that was.

Benry unwrapped the blanket just enough that his head was visible, tears were at the corners of his eyes as he kept his hand to the back of his head.

“That fucking hurt man,” Was all he managed to say at that moment, he felt so stupid.

Gordon offered his hand, which Benry took and they both stood, going back to their beds.

“You sure you don't want to talk about it man?” Gordon grabbed his phone, checking something it seemed. He typed some things and then put it down in his lap, looking back up at Benry, who was fidgeting with the bottom of his shirt.

“I don't know what I'd even say man” He took a pause to yawn, and then scoffed at himself for the action. “I feel like shit right now, this sucks. People usually feel like this?”

Gordon didn’t entirely understand the question. 

“Feel like what? Tired? A demon did who knows what to you and all it does is make you tired? Have you never been tired before man?” Gordon couldn't hide the confusion in his voice, he really had no idea what the hell that meant. He failed to see the flinch when he said the word ‘demon’.

“Huh?” Was all he responded with. Gordon sighed.

“Dude you were asleep for like 16 hours, you scared the living hell out of all of us, I thought you fucking died! Please man, just say _something?_ ” His usual frustration leaked into his words.

“...I saw it in the mirror” He spoke quietly in response, an odd sense of fear in his voice that Gordon had never heard before.

“Is that why you hit your head, man?” He went right back to concerned softness, which meant nothing when their door just about slammed open and in rushed Tommy with Sunkist not far behind. Tommy immediately picked up Benry with ease and hugged him tightly.

“I’M SO GLAD YOU’RE OKAY!!!!” He screamed directly into Benrys ear, twirling around.

He put Benry down and pulled out a soda from his fanny pack, holding it out to Benry who had his hands to his ears for a second. He accepted the soda a bit hesitantly, taking a glance at his glass of water.

He took a sip, it tasted much better than water anyway. He smiled at Tommy the best he could manage, but it wasn't very much.

"Hi Tommy." he spoke casually, sitting back down on the bed.

"Hi! We need to get down to theater class!” He pulled out his phone to show them both the schedule. 

Benry wouldn't say it out loud but he appreciated Tommy acting like things were normal, cause clearly they would be.

\-- --

They arrived at the room, Gordon and Tommy had been talking to each other the whole walk there but Benry stayed oddly silent, not really paying attention. He just about walked into the wall when he turned to follow them into the room, before Tommy pulled him to walk through the door instead.

Benry went to go sit in his usual corner where he helped them make props and set pieces. Some part of him always felt ridiculous about it but more of him liked to create these things. Plus, it was always fun to sit in the corner and watch everyone else act weird in the room.

He pulled out his phone and started scrolling, not really having anything to do at that moment. He felt himself not really processing anything he was looking at, but he didn't entirely care.

He somehow failed to notice a shadow growing over him, silently arriving.

He jumped and even made a little squeak noise as someone put their hand on his shoulder, he even started to shake a little for a second.

“Woah, dude, it's just me, I was just coming over to say that I just remembered I should mention your work,” Gordon spoke softly again. Benry was starting to feel an irritation at how Gordon just kept treating him like this.

“Me and Tommy made sure the stuff you needed was grabbed and the teachers were aware that you were too sick to get out of bed, which… wasn’t a lie. I should’ve mentioned it back in our dorm cause your stuff is under your bed.” For some reason he kept avoiding Benrys eyes. Usually Benry wouldn’t entirely care because eye contact is weird anyway, but something about it bothered him right now.

“Maybe I should go back to our room… I don’t really see much I can do here” Benry tried to sound monotone as usual, but somehow he ended up sounding...bitter. It surprised even himself so he just tried to go back to scrolling on his phone to try and ignore any reaction Gordon might have had.

“I mean… if you want, man.” He couldn’t ignore the twist in his stomach when he heard how Gordon spoke though, sounding surprised and a bit hurt.

Benry stood, not even facing Gordon, and began to walk out. He turned to look at Tommy as he walked out, who was talking and laughing with other students.

As he walked out the door, he looked back at Gordon, who was staring at him with a look on his face that Benry couldn't quite place, but it made his insides twist more anyway.

He walked down the halls as quietly yet as fast as he could, his arms wrapped tightly around himself. What the fuck was his deal right now?? He felt so… emotional. He was never emotional, that was like his whole thing!

It felt like forever on the way back to his room, even though he’d done this route so many times by now. He opened the door a bit too harshly and heard the bang against the wall, flinching. He did his best to shut it lightly. He quickly walked to his bed and laid down, pulling the blanket over himself, fully dressed.

There was an energy running through his body that he was unfamiliar with. He was feeling so many emotions and a need to be doing _anything_ right now, which was unlike how he felt pretty much all the time.

He remembered what Gordon said, his stomach twisting still at how he felt bad. He could just do his classwork, yeah. He would just do that.

So he did. He grabbed the work from under his bed, and began doing it. At first it felt like normal, just any classwork which was annoying to do but he had to do it. But it began to feel...distant. His body began to go on a whole new version of autopilot, as he watched his own hands finish his work with absolute ease, and he finished assignment after assignment like nothing.

He would be overjoyed if it didn’t feel unnatural. Next thing he knew he was putting it right back under his bed, and then just...sitting there, as the world seemed to come right back into his fingertips as if it had just slipped right out of them.

He looked at the time, it'd been about an hour and a half, Gordon should come back any second, they don't try to go _too_ late when they go to that class so late in the day.

Turned out he was right, as he heard the familiar voices of his friends arriving at the door, and then entering. He felt the strange urge to cover himself right back up with the blanket and pretend to sleep, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

Tommy smiled and waved at Benry as he walked in, but Gordon didn’t look at him. Benry frowned, but it was short lived as Tommy offered him another soda. He smiled and prepared to take it.

 _ **“Don’t take it.”**_ What? Why not?

 _ **“You don’t get to question me, just listen.”**_ It spoke intensely, not letting Benry take the soda even though he wanted to. It was just a soda from Tommy?? Why would he reject it?

But he couldn’t seem to do anything but shake his head at the offer fully against his will, and watch as Tommy seemed to take it well, but a look had come across his face fast enough that Benry almost didn’t know if it happened at all. He had never seen a look like that anywhere near Tommys face, it was….strange.

He didn’t like the whole new twisting that arrived in his stomach at the fresh memory.

Emotions suck.

It was almost like he was invisible as Tommy and Gordon sat on Gordons side of the room and continued the conversation they were already having, something about funny stuff that had happened in class.

He just sat up against his wall and stared at his phone, knees to his chest. He was just reading a random post when he heard shuffling and felt a weight added to his bed, but he didn’t look up. The lighting next to him changed and he felt something… wet?

He turned his face to the snout of Sunkist less than an inch from his face. He tried not to react but a grin stretched across his face anyway, and Sunkist took this as a sign to start licking his face. 

This caught Gordons attention, he couldn’t help but smile at the sight. Though when he looked back over at Tommy, Tommy was making a strange face at the sight. 

“It’s… getting late. Maybe me and Sunkist should go back to our room.” Tommy looked at Gordon, not very well hiding the face he was making seconds ago, but trying to make a new expression anyway. Gordon nodded, and looked back at Benry, who was still messing around with Sunkist.

Tommy stood and made his way to the door, patting his leg to get Sunkist to follow, and so she did. 

“It really is getting late…” Gordon began, looking over at Benry, who had already taken his hoodie off. 

“Yeah, yeah, time to sleep or whatever.” Benry replied.

“Dude you slept for forever you can’t possibly be going back to sleep already,” But Benry was already entirely ready to sleep, laying facing away from Gordon, pulling the blanket over himself.

Gordon hoped that things would be normal tomorrow, cause he didn’t understand a single thing that was happening right now.

\-- --

As was obvious, Benry couldn’t sleep, but he was _not_ about to get up and try and do anything else honestly. So he had been laying for at least an hour in the darkness, listening to Gordon snore softly from across the room. 

He was getting real bored of being alone with his thoughts though. He was beginning to wonder about the nameless beast that he thought was supposed to be y’know, possessing him, but he felt sick at the thought and turned over to grab his phone instead.

He didn’t get the chance to even turn the screen on when he heard his dorm room open. What the fuck was anyone doing sneaking into their room??

He looked toward the door, hoping they wouldn’t notice him in the darkness. They walked over next to him, and he held his breath, waiting for them to do something. 

He heard something get placed on his nightstand, and the person turned and walked back to the door. He didn’t even realize they’d turned around till he looked toward them and saw something that made him want to freak the fuck out.

Glowing eyes. Glowing yellow eyes, looking right at Gordon, and then directly at him. Directly into his own eyes.

As the door opened, an unmistakable silhouette was presented to him. Tall, lanky as hell, and wearing a fanny pack.

As the door shut, he used his phone's flashlight to see what the hell was put on his nightstand. It was a soda… sunkist. He saw there was something written on it in sharpie.

It simply read ‘:D ♡’.

What the fuck.


	3. 3. Talking is hard.

It’d been a few days. Everything seemed so… normal, for the most part.

He was in the computer lab programming. It was nice and normal and he enjoyed it, it just came so naturally to him. He couldn’t ignore what felt like another presence in the room as he did it though, which was weird because he knew he was the only one there. 

He turned to check the room again, and jumped when his phone dinged at him. He picked it up to see that it was a text from Gordon.

 **Gordon**  
Hey dude we’re going to the nearby park, wanna come?

 **Benry**  
oh yeah sure dude

And so he saved his progress and shut the computer down, preparing to leave. He just couldn’t shake the feeling of someone else being there in the room as he tried to leave, though.

He stood in the middle of the room and spun to get a look around, and stopped while facing the door.

There was a figure there, blocking his exit. The lighting in the room sucked but it didn’t suck enough to have made the figure out of pure darkness like it was.

His breath got caught as it took a step closer, then another, and another. Soon it was right in front of him, and he did nothing as its claws reached for his face, and more claws grabbed at his arms and his neck.

_**“You think you’re prepared to handle me, I know it… but you can’t handle shit.”** _

He blinked and it disappeared, but the feeling of it grabbing at him still remained.

As quick as he could, he made his way out of the room and toward his dorm where he assumed maybe they were waiting for him…

But they weren’t. 

**Benry**  
bro where are you

 **Gordon**  
On my way back to our room, why?

 **Benry**  
dude we going to the park or.?

 **Gordon**  
Oh yeah we can go to the park if you want man.

 **Benry**  
?? ?  
bro what you just said we were going

 **Gordon**  
No I didn’t..? Plus I only just got out of class like a minute ago.  
Look, man, I’m almost back, let’s just talk in person.

Benry sat at the end of his bed waiting for Gordon to get back. He kept thinking about all the weird shit that’s happened recently. If this was the worst it got, he could definitely handle it, whatever to what that dumb thing said.

Gordon opened the door and sat on his bed, looking confused.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about man but going to the park sounds nice.” He began to put some stuff away. 

Benry pulled out his phone. “Dude just look,” as he showed the texts in question to the other. Gordon looked and then stood back up.

“Yeah no I didn’t send you that or get your text man, but we should go anyway, come on. We should even go get Tommy, it’s nice out today.” Gordon being so casual and careless about it confused Benry. 

He wasn’t going to question it.

\-- --

It was a beautiful day out. The sun was shining and the clouds framed it perfectly, and everyone in the town seemed to be out enjoying it.

The three men were sitting on a bench while Sunkist layed next to it peacefully, casually talking to each other and having a generally nice time.

Gordon, who was sitting in the middle of the group, took advantage of a silence to turn fully toward Benry. Benry felt funny at the action, but the look on Gordons face concerned him.

“Dude, we _really_ need to talk about what happened, please.” He was talking all softly again, which he hadn’t done for a day or so. Benry didn’t know why or like that it got on his nerves so much.

“We don’t have to talk about shit man.” He hated how pissy he sounded. Why did he sound so mad? Why did he _feel_ so mad??

And why did he continue to make Gordon look so… upset.

“Come on man, this isn’t like anything else. This isn’t like falling on your face or getting sick from stupid garbage or even breaking a bone. You summoned a demon! And it like...went into you or something! You could be fucking posessed!” He easily returned to his irritated state, but Benry could tell he was holding back more things to say.

“It’s whatever dude, like yeah I’ve been hallucinating a bit or something but I probably just ate some bad food...for several days straight…..” He didn’t even believe his excuse. He knew what it was, he knew he was fucked. But he didn’t like the all new type of fear radiating from Gordon. He didn’t like being the source of that fear.

He looked past Gordon to Tommy, who had been quietly listening in. Tommy turned his head away and looked down at Sunkist, who was stretching, and then sitting up next to Tommy.

He looked just like the same Tommy that Benry had known for a while now... But he couldn’t get rid of the fresh memory in his head. 

He looked back at Gordon who had just been staring at him, deep confusion on his face.

“What, I got you speechless, Feetman?” He couldn’t stop the part of him that felt the need to sound less serious, even though it made Gordon look mad afterward.

“Why do I even try with you sometimes, thi-” He sighed, changing his tone back to soft. “This could be so _fucked_ man… I’m begging you please tell me something.”

Benry couldn’t find the words in him as he began to fidget with the strings of his hoodie. He felt so many emotions bubbling up in him like they would just burst out of him, but words always seemed to fail him. He wasn’t used to feeling so much in the first place.

He looked back up at his friends, Tommy watching nearby birds and Gordon staring into Benrys soul. He was just angering and concerning Gordon more than usual, and he didn’t know what he felt about Tommy right now, he was too uncomfortable with the idea of admitting that fear might be it. Fear definitely wasn’t something he was used to either.

He opened his mouth to speak before he was even prepared, and just kept closing and opening a few times, feeling stupid. These emotions and thoughts were all so strong and stupid and he just. Hated how it was making him feel, his chest felt like it was about to burst with all these emotions.

He opened his mouth one more time, just wanting to _scream_ but instead came out...singing.

Singing and… colors???? He put his hands over his mouth to try and stop it but it just seeped through his fingers, the feeling of it was indescribable.

It floated into the air around him, dissipating a bit above them. All three of them watched the smoke-like substance do its own thing.

“Green to grey-blue….that means scared and confused!” Tommy said quietly and maybe a bit too enthusiastically, but that was just how he was.

Benry buried his face in his hands as Gordon turned to Tommy.

“What?”

“I read it, it said- says scared and confused!”

“Read it?? What are you talking about??”

“I read it in a book!”

At least Benry didn’t need to say words to let them know how he felt right now. Gordon turned back around to Benry, once again talking in that excruciatingly soft way.

“Is- Is that how you’re feeling right now? Please man I just want to help you,”

Benry turned to face directly at Gordon and opened his mouth, singing red notes right into Gordons eyes. Gordon jumped back a bit and rubbed at his eyes.

“That one meant mad!” Tommy said ever so cheerily from behind Gordon, and Gordon groaned.

“Come on man! Why are you even angry right now, what the hell do I have to do to get you to talk to me, or at least say something!” He ran his hands through his hair, looking out at the other people in the park.

Benry mumbled something to himself like a child.

“What? What did you say, man?” 

“I said stop treating me like a fucking kid whos dog died man! I’m absolutely _fucked_ and maybe I’d rather just ignore it ‘till it kills me.” He began angry but ended quietly, looking down the whole time to avoid seeing the looks on the others faces.

“Th-that’s not going to help anything man!!” Gordon was just about ready to go off, but was interrupted. 

“M-maybe we should stop arguing and go back to your guys’ room…” Tommy spoke, anxiously petting Sunkist on the far end of the bench. Gordon turned to Tommy and nodded, but Benry couldn’t stop the emotions he still felt swirling around within him.

He pulled his hat as far down over his face as possible and laid against the back of the bench, singing colors to the sky.

“Maybe we can call that the sweet voice, cause it sounds so pretty.” Gordon spoke calmly, watching the colors swirl into the sky.

“So many colors! So many reds and blues and... pinks, awww!!!”

“What does the pink mean, Tommy?”

“It means you’re getting all too up in my business, bro.” Benry stopped sweet voicing to say, and then stood. “I’m going back to our room, follow me if you want.”

\-- --

They were in a similar position to how they’d been before, Tommy and Gordon sitting on Gordons bed talking while Benry sat up against the wall on his own bed with Sunkist next to him.

He was idly petting her as he scrolled on his phone, post after post of nonsense and weird shitposts. The others were across the room watching some show on Gordons laptop, seeming to enjoy their time.

Benry began to think, a dangerous game, about what had happened earlier. The ‘sweet voice’... what the fuck was up with that. He’d never heard of a demon having that kind of shit and it also seemed too… nice for a demon anyway. Singing and colors that are based on emotion?? Demons don’t even have emotions.

 _Hey what is this stuff about, bro?_ He thought out into his mind, trying to reach a place he didn’t entirely know how to reach.

As he expected, no answer, so he just went back to scrolling. Stupid meme, tumblr screenshot (on tumblr??) more stupid posts, etc., etc..

He looked over at the other two, Tommy smiling like the ray of sunshine that he is and Gordon looking confused but happy nonetheless.

Benry got up from his spot and made his way next to Tommy, Sunkist following and laying her head down on his lap.

“Yo, what’re you guys watching?” He spoke casually as he leaned against Tommy, who turned to look at Benry and Sunkist.

He began to talk about what it was and said many things about it, gladly telling him and Gordon both all he could. Benry knew he would do this and he happily listened because the shine in Tommy's eyes was so cute.

He looked past Tommy for a second to see Gordon also looking at Tommy, but trying not to very much. They both looked at each other for a second, and Benry quickly looked down at his strings that he continued to fidget with.

He felt himself fall out of focus of the world against his will, the sound of Tommy infodumping seeming to muffle. He put his hand on Sunkists head to pet her idly again, trying to keep his focus around him, but it didn’t help.

_**“You humans have a strange existence… it’s hilarious. No power of your own until it’s enabled by a creature with power.”** _

_Is that what the sweet voice is?_

It did not reply.

He still felt out of focus when he felt himself speak, only just processing the words.

“Maybe we should just watch it.” He had seemed to say… and interrupting Tommy to say it.

He only just processed Tommy stopping his talk and how hurt he looked, even though he tried to hide it with a smile.

“Of course!...” He had said, starting up the show.

Benry tried as hard as he could to come back into focus, to feel the world in his fingertips again, but the harder he tried, the more the world grew dark for him.

Gordon was staring over at Benry after he interrupted Tommy. He wanted to yell so badly at him for being a dick but he wasn’t going to make things worse. 

It was hard when there was a little smug grin on the bastard's face though. 

They watched the show in a now tense silence. Gordon didn’t entirely understand the show even when Tommy happily explained it, but there was something about Tommy’s joy that was just so hard to say no to even if it got in the way of other things. He didn’t need to do anything right now, though.

It wasn’t long before a growl began. Sunkist was growling, and scooting away from Benry.

It obviously caught both Gordon’s and Tommy's attention, them both looking over. Gordon felt an anger he wasn’t a stranger of burst in him, wondering angrily what Benry could have possibly done to upset Sunkist.

He couldn’t even read the look on the man's face, as he looked at the dog backing away from him. He didn’t even flinch as she suddenly and quickly made her way over to get in between him and Tommy, who had a very confused look on his face.

Benry _finally_ made a smart move and scooted his way off the bed, slowly making his way over to his bed, and sitting once again against his own wall. Sunkists growling barely changed though.

He sighed and made his way out the door, disappearing into the hall.

Gordon and Tommy looked at each other for a second. Sunkist immediately calmed down, laying up against her owner.

“I’ve… never seen her get like that before…” Gordon spoke hesitantly, not being able to organize the thoughts in his head.

“She _hasn’t_ ever gotten like that before!” Tommy replied, fear coating his voice along with the already obvious confusion.

“Where do you think he went…?” 

“I don’t know but- but I hope he’s okay!” Tommy was now petting Sunkist, who was staring up at him, and then at Gordon.

The look in her eyes told him things he couldn’t quite understand yet.

They continued watching their show for a while.

\-- --

Benry's world faded back into view and feeling. He looked around to see that it was dark out, and he wasn’t entirely sure where he even was. 

He wandered a bit and realized he was in one of the patches of trees on campus, and a walk that wasn’t that long in reality, but felt like forever in that moment.

Making his way home, he watched the people around him. People walking around living their lives just fine around him, street lamps illuminating the area in a vibe he didn’t know how to describe, but it felt unsettling right now.

His building up ahead, he took a look around him, feeling so alone yet like someone was watching him.

Looking up at the building itself, he saw one window that had blinds open to darkness, but he swore he saw a face looking out of it.

He hurried toward the door and to the stairs.

The hall to his room wasn’t usually so long but every step seemed to take eons. All he wanted was to lay in bed, whether it was his own or even Gordons. He couldn’t tell if he wanted physical contact right now or not, even if his arms did ache to hold warmth.

Step.  
Step.  
Step.

Desperately his hand reached for the knob of his current home, the safety and comfort of the small room being all he wanted right now.

He couldn’t even really say what had happened in what seemed to be a gap of memory, but it left him feeling so alone… so confused.

He hated to consider being scared.

The door was locked. He felt his breath quicken involuntarily as he searched his pockets for his key, finding nothing.

He knocked a bit too harshly, hoping it wasn’t so late that Gordon fell asleep.

A second turned into a few seconds, to half a minute, Benry felt the emptiness of the hall surround him in an oddly suffocating way, haunting him.

The door opened, Benry went to rush in without even thinking about it, running directly into Gordon, who grunted, looking less than pleased to see him. They made their way into the room enough to close the door.

“Hey, uh, what the fuck, man!” Gordon just about yelled, gesturing to the door and then Benry and to their beds, not really making sense.

“.....Huh?” Benry replied, knowing it was the wrong thing to say, but he couldn’t help it in the moment.

“Yo-you j-just-!!!!” Gordon ran his hands down his face in pure frustration.

Benry walked over to Gordon’s bed and sat down on it, patting the spot next to him. Gordon scoffed but obliged.

“So uhhh… where’d Tommy go?” Benry asked, looking at the clock, it was late but not extremely.

“He left to go to bed, what else, man? Where the fuck were you for the past few hours?” Gordon was staring over at Benry’s bed space, but Benry wasn’t really sure why.

“Uhhhh just chillin, bro.” He answered, not ready to admit the truth.

“Oh, just chilling after you were being a prick to Tommy, real nice man.” Gordon looked over to his friend, who was now looking away, tugging at his hat.

“I-I was….?” He looked over to Gordon, failing to continue his streak of being chill, his genuine emotion showing through. 

Gordon couldn’t hide his surprise, taking a moment to take in the sight before him, but soon recovering.

“You don’t even realize you were being a dick, nice, man. Bet you don’t even know what you did to get Sunkist to freak out like that either, huh?” Gordon was so quick to anger, he was barely taking a moment to take in the look on Benrys face as he spoke, a collection of confusion and a bit of fear.

“Whuhhh….What did I do?”

Gordon took another moment to look Benry in the eyes, finally processing a bit of the truth.

“Fuck, you really don’t know what you did, do you?” Gordon felt he didn’t entirely understand the full depth of what was happening, but he knew he had been reacting wrong.

He put his hand on Benrys shoulder, but it was quickly changed to a full on hug as Benry fell right into him and just layed there against him, both wrapping their arms around each other.

Benry was not the type to get emotional or try to initiate physical contact, and Gordon was fine with that because Benry was cold to the touch and hard to be serious with anyway. Gordon hugged tighter.

“Can I chill in your bed tonight, Feetman?” Gordon sighed, the other still had to sprinkle weird jokes in whenever he could… but he wasn’t going to be mad about it right now.

“Yeah, you can.” 

And so they got ready for bed, and soon were in darkness as Gordon was laying down to sleep, but Benry was sitting criss cross against the wall next to him, not quite ready yet.

Gordon was about to ask if he was going to even sleep, but a lovely noise began above him, and the room illuminated a little bit, pink and blue spiraling around their corner of the room.

Gordon turned to face the source, watching the worry fade from his friend's face as he sang his heart out in the darkness. He smiled.

He was beautiful.


	4. 4. Trying to talk anyway.

Gordon awoke the next morning freezing cold, even though he was underneath his blanket.

He tiredly reached around only to realize one of his arms was trapped beneath the cold source. He could not move his arm despite his efforts.

He laid there for a minute to prepare himself to open his eyes. Three… two… one… open!

Only inches away was another pair of eyes, staring into his soul. He quietly gasped out of surprise and felt a shiver run down his already freezing spine.

The eyes were unblinking and unmoving. Was he in a nightmare? Was he dead? His tired mind could not wrap around what was happening, but he knew he didn't like it one bit.

Suddenly the eyes and the entire face they belonged to moved closer and down 'til they were buried against his chest. He didn't process it fast enough to move away.

"You're so soft and warm!" 

Oh, it was Benry.

"Dude… yo-you're so so c-cold," Gordon stuttered, shivering. The memories of the night before cleared his sleep-foggy brain as he leaned his face against the poofy hair belonging to the other.

Benry seemed to ignore the obvious point that he was supposed to move away from Gordon for Gordons sake as he laid up against him.

“Since w-when does anything being warm even m-mean anything to you, man! I’ve seen you w-walk outside in a t-shirt and s-shorts when it was like -15°f and you didn’t even give a s-shit!” Gordon shuffled his way away from Benry’s frigid touch, accidentally making his way off the bed.

Benry peeked his head over the side of the bed and tried his best to stop himself from laughing, but failed. Gordon rested for a second, his head hurting.

Gordon reached his hand up and grabbed Benrys, pulling him down on the floor too. Benry yelped on the way down and also let out some sweet voice, orange. A new color, Gordon noted.

Gordon felt a stinging pain from his hand as soon as Benry hit the floor, taking a few seconds to realize what it was.

“Did you just _bite_ me??”

The smirk on Benry’s face told him the answer. Gordon shoved Benrys face away from him as he sat up, leaning against his nightstand. Benry didn't move though, just lying there for a minute.

"You just feel nice… “ 

Gordon felt heat rush to his cheeks as he realized what the reply was to. He wasn’t used to this new version of Benry… he liked it. He rubbed his hand until he felt fine.

But he had to get up, so he stood.

“One day I’m _so_ getting back at you for that bite, by the way.” Gordon grabbed his clothes for the day, putting them on without a care for the others' view of him.

“Yeah, sure, man.” Benry buried his face in his arms on the ground, not caring to get up just yet.

Gordon continued to get ready for the day, grabbing some stuff and standing by the door.

“By the way, we have something to do when I’m done with my stuff for the morning, so don’t go back to sleep or anything.” He spoke, opening the door and leaving.

The remaining of the two sat up in his spot on the ground, still waking up just a bit. He did his best to collect his thoughts and feelings into any form of coherency as he looked around the small room.

He began looking at his current clothes, a tank top and boxers… he felt a strange wonder as to why he insisted on sleeping in a shirt, why was the reason blurring to him?

He took the top off of himself and inspected what was covered. Oh yeah, scars. Why hide those like that, only like one person would ever see? 

He felt strange about this train of thought and opted for climbing back into Gordon’s bed instead. Covering himself in the warm blanket that was just so big and fluffy. Not to mention, he thought it smelled nice.

He was now too awake to sleep, but too tired to do much… lame. Being tired sucked.

Yet the feeling of just lying there with his eyes closed and the blanket pulled over him was so, so wonderful, even if his eyes kinda hurt. And a rumble was beginning in his brain.

Wait, what?

_**“You make this so boring.”** _

Oh. That doesn’t seem like a good thing.

He helplessly stayed curled within the thick blanket as he felt a pit grow in his stomach, turning a neutral yet happy-leaning mood into… hell.

It was nothing he’d really felt before. He felt the intense need to cry the feeling away but no tears came, and he squeezed the blanket around him tight, the air limiting. 

_Man, what’s my fucking problem?? Why did I do this to myself? I-I’d rather,,_

He did his best to stop the onslaught of painful, horrible thoughts, but he felt too weak, and just let himself lay in the pain he was seemingly creating for himself.

It was an eternity it had felt like, waiting for someone, anyone to save him, but at the same time he asked himself… would anyone really care enough to?

…

…

…

The door opened, and footsteps quickly paused when they’d barely begun. 

“Benry? Are you in here…?” He couldn’t find it in himself to answer or even move in response.

The footsteps resumed, pausing between the two beds. A hand felt around the top of the mound that was Benry, before attempting to pull the blanket off of him, although failing.

“Come on man, I told you not to go back to sleep.” He attempted to pull the blanket again, but it didn’t budge.

There was a moment of silence.

Suddenly strong arms were shoving Benry over, flipping the man to a side where the blanket was open at all, and the blanket was pulled entirely off of him before he could protest. Not that he felt he could.

The cold air was sudden, and a bit overwhelming, and the tears he couldn’t previously cry were now threatening to run down his face as he looked up at Gordon, whose expression went from one of irritation to concern at the sight before him.

Gordon looked like he would say words, but none came out. Instead he sat down on the bed and put his hand on Benry’s shoulder. 

They stayed like that for a little bit.

Gordon quietly began to put stuff away though, trying to keep the peaceful quiet.

Benry appreciated the rare moment of silence from Gordon.

He sat up slowly, not bothering to reach for the blanket. He tried to ignore the harsh discomfort he was feeling about how exposed he felt, but he couldn’t deny the feeling when he saw Gordon looking over at him.

“Like what you see?” He attempted to joke, but he just sounded sad as he did.

Gordon just smiled at him, trying to be sweet. Despite how long they’d known each other and how close they’ve become, he’d never seen the other look like this, so he assumed whatever was the cause was too bad to mess with.

This action however, confused Benry who instead looked away, waiting for the next inevitable move on Gordons part.

“We uh… need to go somewhere, you should get dressed.” Gordon tried to say considerately.

Benry took his time to get ready, though when he grabbed his hoodie he felt the pit in his stomach seem to dissolve, and he took a second to process, accidentally letting out some orange sweet voice again.

“What does the orange mean?” Gordon asked.

“Huh?”

Gordon sighed.

Benry finally finished getting dressed and grabbed his phone, looking up at Gordon. Gordon smiled at him, and then was surprised by Benry smiling right back.

\-- --

They arrived at a classroom Benry had only seen once before, and he began to guess what they were doing a little too late.

Gordon knocked and only seconds later the door opened to the joyous friendly face of Dr. Coomer. 

“Ah, hello Gordon!”

“Afternoon, Dr. Coomer!” Gordon replied politely. Dr. Coomer stepped back as the two young men entered the room.

They took their seats at a table across from Bubby, who looked irritated, but that might just have been his default expression. Coomer made his way over as well.

Benry had his head in his arms on the table, barely listening for the first few minutes as the others all talked about paranormal basic shit. Ghosts and demons, Coomer making their previous job as paranormal investigators sound like an epic quest while Bubby made it sound like shit (but still cool, because he wouldn’t have done it if it weren’t.)

“Do you guys… have any idea what went down that night even? Have you seen that before?” Gordon asked them, catching Benry’s attention by finally asking direct questions.

Both of the older men took a moment to think, Coomer being the one to answer.

“Well it clearly wouldn’t be the first time demon summoning has taken place, hell, we’ve done it before!” a look of guilt seemed to flash across Bubby's face, but quickly disappeared. “But _that_ didn’t happen when we did… and we never had any other experience with it.”

“Because we aren’t _stupid_ and didn’t do it just for fun! We were prepared and did it for an actual reason!” Bubby cut in before Coomer could continue. Coomer put his hand on Bubby’s, seeming to indicate he should calm down.

“Be nice, this is serious darling! they could really be (and excuse my language) fucked! I’m not entirely sure which one they summoned, the circle was regular, but he could have said any of the words! There’s many possibilities from that!” Coomer continued with a near-cheery tone.

Benry felt a hand touch his shoulder and he jumped, and the hand pulled away.

“Woah, man, it’s just me. I was going to ask if you still remember what the hell you even said when you did that” Gordon began to speak softly, but seemed to remember mid-sentence to not do that.

Benry lifted his head up to look at his friend, and shook his head, not feeling able to speak. Gordon sighed.

“Does it mean anything that it hasn’t really… appeared yet?” He continued to ask the older men.

Benry opened his mouth, but it didn’t seem to catch their attention.

“Well, it would either mean he isn’t possessed, or it's a very sneaky demon! The sneaky ones are the more dangerous… and well, if that turns out to be the case, we might just have to kill him!” Coomer still spoke much too cheerily. 

“Wh.. what??” Gordon asked fearfully, Benry was staring at Dr. Coomer. Coomer laughed.

“I’m kidding, we aren’t going to kill anyone! But it is genuinely very serious if it's one of the tricky ones… many are ‘amateur’ and immediately hop to open possession… it’s difficult with the ones who are more hidden. You’re sure neither of you have noticed anything?”

Gordon seemed to hesitate. He looked at Benry who didn’t react.

“You should show them, Benry.”

Benry was confused for a second, thinking about everything he’s seen in this time that he could possibly mean.

“Wha?”

Gordon groaned.

“The sweet voice, man!”

Ohhhh.

All three other pairs of eyes were directly on him as he prepared himself to use the strange power he acquired.

He sang a soft blue into existence.

Silence for a minute, the colors swirling upward and fading away. 

“Oh that’s… something for sure.” Coomer took a pause to think. “It definitely means something is there though. Human beings with powers aren't unheard of, though! Obviously not anything that happens often... “ Coomer seemed unsure what to say.

Both Coomer and Gordon seemed in thought, Bubby watching his husband and Benry awkwardly staring at the table as he waited for more. 

“Hey, I know it had gotten interrupted but didn’t you begin to say you saw something after it happened?” Benry felt a fear rise in him. “Like, in the bathroom when you hit your head?” Oh.

He hesitated, he had almost forgotten about that one after the other things that had happened. He slightly nodded.

He couldn’t seem to find his voice though, but they were all waiting for him to speak.

He looked at the far corner, trying to find it in him to say anything.

The corner, already oddly lit like in any classroom, seemed to grow darker. Darker, darker, darker, till it was pitch black. He questioned if maybe he was just staring too long, but he couldn’t pull his eyes away.

It began to expand, and he hadn’t even realized he’d scooted closer to Gordon until he was singing orange notes and grabbing at Gordon’s arm next to his under the table.

The grounding feeling of his warm arm and the harsh notes he made himself made the darkness quickly fade, and he felt released from the stare as he looked over to his friend.

He hated the deeply concerned look on his face.

He looked back down at the table.

“I… don’t want to talk about it.”

The silence was killing him, so he pulled up his hood and put his face into Gordon’s shoulder to try and ignore the embarrassment eating away at him.

When they eventually began to talk again, he listened, but his mind was racing with all the recent memories.

Fake texts… grabbed by shadows… so many eyes… and…

He lifted his head up and pulled the hood down, his hat going a bit askew. He was barely processing the current things being said as his head buzzed with a burning question.

“Hey, what do you do if you think someone else is possessed?” He took the smallest pause between them to say, catching their attention and confusion.

Another deadly silence as his question was processed in Coomers brain.

“Dude, what?” Gordon had asked beside him, but his confusion was quickly dismissed when Coomer spoke up.

“We would simply do what we’re doing now! Figuring out if you’re possessed and then we would have to come up with the proper way to get rid of the one possessing you, the more dangerous ones can be more difficult to get rid of!”

“But what if you don’t want to… let that person know you’re trying to find out if they’re possessed…?”

Another moment to think.

“You’d just have to keep a good eye on them!” Coomer replied, as helpfully as he could, but it didn’t feel helpful to Benry.

He looked over to Gordon, his confusion persisting on his face, but he knew better than to question Benry, at least, for now.

Gordon shook his head as he returned to the conversation with the older men.

Benry put his hood up and face back into Gordon’s shoulder as he chilled out for the rest of the time.

\-- --

“Do you realize how actually freezing fucking cold you are?” Gordon said as they made their way down the hall away from the room.

Benry got closer to Gordon and put his cold hands right on his shoulder, that shoulder backing from the touch near instantly. Gordon made a small scoff noise, but was smiling.

“Sometimes I wonder if you even have blood or if you’re just a really solid ghost.” Gordon continued, turning the corner.

“Yeah, when I passed out for 16 hours I actually died.” Benry had said monotone yet jokingly, but it didn’t seem to be that funny to Gordon, whose smile dropped. 

Step, step step, through the halls they went, silence otherwise. Benry put his hands in his pockets and watched the doors and people pass, trying to squash the feelings he felt, but not entirely doing well.

“You sure sounded like you had stuff on your mind back there. You do realize it would feel really good to talk about them right? To stop bottling all this shit up? This is really not the situation to be quiet about what's going on, man.” Gordon’s voice cut through Benry’s thoughts.

“‘S easy for you to say.”

“What? Come on, man, for your own damn sake!” Gordon kept pushing, not getting very far.

Benry took a deep breath, accidentally letting out some red sweet voice during the exhale, catching some looks from people they passed by.

_Don’t be an asshole, don’t say something that’ll just make it worse._

He couldn’t seem to think of anything that wouldn’t make it worse though, so he just stayed silent.

He still felt like an ass for it.

He glanced at Gordon, who looked irritated.

They both stayed silent for the next few minutes till they finally reached their room.

“Yoo, you should let me play games on your computer, bro.” Benry said as they both sat down to chill, looking over at his roommate.

“Benry we’ve been over this, my laptop is only made for classwork and also sucks too much to run games, I’ve tried. I _know_ you’ve tried.”

He wasn’t wrong.

Benry sighed, mobile games suck, but just sitting there was boring.

“What was up with what you said earlier anyway? About someone else being possessed?” 

Oh fuck, he was hoping Gordon had forgotten about that.

“Oh, uhhh… you know.” He did not say anything else.

“ _Benry. I swear on my life man._ ” Gordon warned intensely. Usually it was hard to take him seriously when he got irritated because he always seemed so comical, but this time it made Benry feel weird.

“I uhhh just keep seeing things, it’s nothing.” Benry said casually, staring down at the crappy phone game he was playing.

“N-nothing?? That’s! Not! Nothing!!!” He took short pauses between each word to emphasise the point.

Benry kept failing what he thought should’ve been a very simple game.

“It’s whatever, man.” He said in the same casual way, sounding dismissive despite not feeling like he should.

He looked up at Gordon for a second, across the room staring right back at him. Benry quickly looked back down and quietly sang some electric blue to himself, any stray emotions seeming to dull. Finally, familiar, weak emotions.

“What does blue mean? Why are you doing that man?” Benry felt a balance that was unknowingly messed with return… his calm to Gordons anger.

He turned his phone screen off and fell backwards to his pillow, singing more of the blue softly. The walls began to reflect the blue filling his side of the room.

His own singing had blocked him from hearing shuffling, but couldn’t block the weight that added to his bed.

His color went from blue to a quick orange to pink as he felt familiar warm hands wrap around his and pull him back to a sitting position.

Faces inches apart, the now blue and pink glow around them, Benry stared wide-eyed.

He didn’t realize he’d kept softly singing pinks till Gordon was shoving them out of his face and backing away from Benry a bit.

“Benry, I know you like to say weird shit sometimes, especially in a way that seems genuine when it's not, but I _know_ you had to mean what you said, man. You just had to.”

Even as Benry looked away from Gordon, watching his colorful creations disappear and the normal lighting return, he felt the others’ stare digging into him.

He took the moment to think, genuinely wondering if he should tell or not.

Memory replaying in his head, over and over. Those _eyes._ The shape of the figure as they walked out… the gift they’d left. Either someone had been doing a really weird fucked up prank or… something was wrong with his friend.

He knew it would be right to bring it up to Gordon, they could both help their friend! Gordon could be better about than Benry could, even.

Yet any words Benry tried to speak caught in his throat, not even giving him a chance. He opened his mouth, trying so hard… he just couldn’t.

He put his hands to Gordon’s shoulders, Gordon visibly shivering at the sudden chill. It also seemed to take a second for Gordon to realize that Benry was actively touching him first right now. He looked very confused, staring at Benry still.

The staring did not help.

Benry heard a rumble begin in his mind, but nothing followed it.

He scrunched his face for a second, frustration getting to him.

He ended up spewing a red-gray sweet voice right into Gordon’s face, leaving little specks of the color as it bounced off him.

A look of conflict was ever-changing upon Gordon’s face, seeming to loop with each ball of light that papped against him.

As soon as it stopped he took a pause and then grew irritated. He opened his mouth to speak.

Benry acted without thinking, not wanting to be scolded by Gordon for once, he sang the same blue from before right into Gordon’s open mouth.

He didn’t seem to process the substance going into his mouth till it was done, only closing his now stained mouth seconds later with a strange look on his face.

“It tastes so strongly of blue raspberry holy shit,” Was all he seemed to say, wiping at his face. 

Benry would have found it funny had he not felt bad. 

“I-I can’t...can’t….” He certainly couldn’t speak, that was for sure. He put his hands to his face and shook his head, giving up instead. 

He wanted so badly to speak, he didn’t want his friend to possibly be hurt, but he couldn't seem to avoid his own hurt. 

“What if I’m the reason....” He had accidentally muttered out loud, almost not realizing.

“Reason for what…?” Gordon tried to ask, but he should have known better.

Benry let out a soft ‘muh’ along with a little burst of pink sweet voice, Gordon sighing next to him.

Benry fell back onto his pillow once again, and Gordon returned to his own side of the room to do his own thing.

Blue sweet voice began to fill the corner once again, Benry doing his best to keep the calm emotions he so liked.

But the effects of the sweet voice seemed to only numb the feelings, not the thoughts.

_What if I’m the reason Tommy could be possessed right now, too?_


	5. 5. Normal, right...?

A soft noise rang out into the room, the door opening and closing.

Through it came a short man, standing in place, observing the room.

A can of soda was offered to him only seconds later.

Smiling as he accepted the offer, Benry followed Tommy deeper into the room.

It was rare that anyone was ever in Tommy’s room. It’s not that it was a bad place, or that Tommy didn’t like the idea of his friends being there, but his room was like its own world, better off with only its two citizens and no one else to mess with it.

Benry took his place on Tommy’s bed, Tommy sitting in his desk chair. Sunkist was wagging her tail calmly from her bed across from Tommy’s.

As he looked around the room, Benry began thinking of how to word what he wanted to say. He took note of the shelves covered in things that spanned Tommy’s interests, the collection having grown since Benry had seen it last.

Tommy was finishing some work, filling the silence with the sounds of pencil writing. He seemed unbothered by the quiet, but Benry didn’t like it, not right now.

“I um…” Benry began too early, regretting it. Tommy paused his writing, indicating he was listening. Benry scooted toward the edge, putting his feet to the ground, sitting close to Tommy.

“This is going to be sucks for both of us but… can we have a moment of eye contact? I just want to make a point.” Benry spoke softly, hesitation clear. Tommy also seemed to hesitate, a look of thought painting his face.

Tommy turned, not looking Benry in the face, which wasn’t unusual. Benry reached out and held Tommys hands, knowing Tommy wouldn’t mind. Small hands in big ones, soft and warm. An underrated feeling, Benry thinks.

Benry didn’t care for eye contact much either. It made his body scream with protest, it feeling too invasive, too awkward. Even trying to just look around the other person's face or near surroundings felt awkward, he’d rather just look away and listen without the extra obligation. So he understood Tommy’s hesitation to accept his request fully.

But seconds later, both were uncomfortably looking each other in the eyes. Benry held his breath, not only nervous to speak, but also trying to keep the moment going longer without meaning to. So pretty..

“I’m sorry,” Benry shoved the words out, hoping it didn’t make him sound ingenuine. A look of confusion spread across Tommy’s face.

 _Don’t get distracted by his eyes_ Benry reminded himself, but he was having a hard time. At first glance you wouldn’t be able to categorize the others’ eye color because you’d try to place it in the natural eye color slots. Green? An oddly bright brown? No, they were yellow. Vibrant, so so pretty. His body and mind were screaming at him but he just. Didn’t listen, not until the others’ eyes moved, cracking under the stare.

“About being an ass to you recently!” He continued, also cracking as he turned away, blushing from embarrassment. “I feel bad about being rude to you, I was not a cool.”

He took the silence to think about the eyes he just saw. Yes they were really pretty, he loved looking at them even if it also felt weird. But he couldn’t stop his brain from beginning to spiral, memories and thoughts, demons and-

“It’s okay!” Tommy squeezed Benry’s hands, a soft gesture, lovely. A smile on his face as he cheerily forgave his friend. Benry didn’t realize he was holding his breath till he released it.

Both of them forgot to let go of each other's hands, silence once again.

It was a bright day, the light illuminating the room, everything seeming to be bright as well. He felt the light in his bones, at least for that moment.

He decided to do something he felt he might soon regret, but in that moment felt right.

“Can I… maybe vent a bit to you? Only a little?” Benry asked, voice nearly blending with the world around them.

Tommy nodded, still smiling.

“I’m…” He wanted to swallow the words before he even said them, he was already beginning to regret this. 

Another squeeze of the hands. He was never one to be physical before, not ever understanding why his two friends were so touchy, but now he was beginning to understand.

“I don’t know what to do… and I hate it. And I think it might be even worse than I thought? I hope I didn’t fuck up too bad. Things are changing! I don’t want that. Gordon’s all concerned for me and shit, he won’t stop trying to get me to talk! He knows I don’t like that…” He took a pause to sigh. “I just want things to be normal.”

"Then let's make it normal!" 

"What?"

Tommy stood, and before Benry could process, lifted Benry up by the under of his arms, almost a foot off the ground.

Shock was sent through his body at the touch, every part of him screaming as he began to struggle, desperate to remove the source of the sudden panic.

Tommy suddenly dropped him, surprised by the freaking out.

Benry took a moment to regain his breath and balance, catching the attention of Sunkist, who came to his side to try and comfort. He put his hand to her head and spent a moment petting her soft fur.

“I-I’m sorry, I thought it would be fun to carry you! I had an idea of what to do!” Tommy apologized, guilt clear.

Benry quietly nodded, grabbing one of Tommys hands and pulling toward the door. They made their way out.

\-- --

He began to realize, staring at the woods from the car window, that he should really begin to ask questions more… just a little bit.

They’d been driving for a little while, traveling farther and farther from civilization, more into many, many trees. Occasional buildings, almost all empty and/or half-destroyed.

Tommy was driving, rambling happily to the others in the car. It was the familiar trio, yes, but also 2 friends of Tommys from classes.

Benry didn’t know them honestly, but then again he didn’t really know anyone more than his close two anyway, he felt no need to have any more than them.

He was with the two people he trusted most knowing they’d never hurt him, not on purpose anyway, yet he felt anxiety claw at him as they drove further and further. He couldn’t even pinpoint why, what he was possibly dreading. Something bad happening? Someone going to hurt him, will he hurt someone? Or maybe it was just pointless pain.

He turned to look next to him, Gordon was also talking to the others from the middle back seat. They were all talking and laughing and having a nice time it seemed. He felt a tug of pain, he felt left out.

He wasn’t going to join anyway, though.

Turn a corner, another corner, and finally as they arrived at a little collection of half broken old houses, they slowed down on what used to be a normal road.

They continued to talk and have fun as they all got out of the car, Benry hopping out last. 

“Uhhh…” He softly began, unsure to speak or not. He got closer to Gordon without even thinking about it, the group went quiet to look at him, but it made the strange anxiety ring loudly through him.

When did he even start feeling like this? He never would have before.

“Where are we?”

“You said you wanted normal, so we’re doing normal things! Isn’t this the type of stuff you’d like…?” Tommy said, beginning to sound unsure. Benry nodded, watching the sun shine on the group. His eyes stopped on Tommy.

Tommy, even from a few feet away, still felt like a tower. That height used to make Benry feel a weird sense of comfort, especially when Tommy could pick him up with ease and just carry him around like a cat. But now… it felt intimidating. Like a building alone in the suburbs ready to fall over and crush innocent homes.

He shook the feeling away as they all began to walk to the smallest of the houses, undertones of anxiety still clinging to his being from every side. 

The place was only one floor and if it had ever had more than one room, it was unclear by now. Half the house was caved and open to the bright sunlight and rubble was all over.

They all kicked rubble around till there was a circle for them to all sit in in the middle of the sunlight. The warmth was soft, sweet, though it was coated in a film of dust that surrounded them from all over.

Benry felt small sitting there. He was always the shortest in any room but it never bothered him, he was always so sure of himself, but he felt small. Tommy to his right, Gordon to his left, and the two people he couldn’t remember the names of finishing the circle in front of him. He felt like a rat surrounded by dogs.

Gordon bumped shoulders with him, pulling him out of his mini trance. Benry looked at him, and Gordon smiled. 

“You good man?” Gordon asked, looking directly at him, but Benry was looking toward the trees to his left. He didn’t feel up to pretend to look him in the eyes.

He nodded and smiled a slight bit, knowing it was unconvincing, but he caught Gordon moving his face to look past him from the corner of his eye, and Gordon didn’t push.

They all seemed to be talking about fun times from theater class. Benry hadn’t even helped them make props in a while, he remembered. That kinda sucked, he liked making things, why didn’t he do that anymore?

Something something, someone kicking their shoe into the ceiling on accident, blah blah people falling on their ass. Benry was listening but he was bored of it. Not even the anxious feelings pulling at him could stop him as he suddenly stood up and walked around, almost not noticing the silent confusion from the person who was speaking, which was one of the strangers.

“He does that, it’s nothing to worry about.” Gordon assured her, Benry just kept wandering around, kicking at the stuff on the floor. Bricks, dust, things too destroyed or gross to tell, bugs.

This house sucked.

He looked to the walls, the drop of the destruction not being immediate… enough that he could probably climb it. Surely if part of the roof were still standing it would be strong enough to hold his little frame.

Not that he bothered to think even that much about it as he began to climb, loose bricks shifting and shaking under him, threatening to fall apart under his gremlin grip.

He didn’t bother to try and listen past the noise he was making, reaching the flat roof shortly. He stood, creaks crying out with his every move. He didn’t have to feel small up here, he thought as he looked down at the group.

They were all looking up at him, they all looked anxious but also a bit excited, except for Gordon who was standing and looked horrified.

“Benry what the fuck?? You’re gonna hurt yourself dumbass!” He yelled up, walking over under the edge of the roof. Benry stuck his tongue out and walked around, the ever creaking roof begging him to stop. The roof was just as boring as the floor, but at least the risk was kinda fun.

Circling around a bit, he stopped back above Gordon, who now was joined by the others who were all talking. His creaking caught their attention.

Looking out ahead at the surrounding trees and grass, the sun illuminating everything, the world so green. It looked pretty even if the brightness was a bit stinging.

He saw something move in the distant cluster of trees, wondering which animal it was.

But as it crawled out of the plants slowly, he realized it had too many limbs. It was like a large spider… but also a black hole in the world itself. 

And then it looked at him. Too many eyes. It continued to crawl, coming right for them. It began so slowly.... But sped up. Running! Right for them!

Panic was rising in him, it was going to hurt them! He knew something wo-

The roof collapsed under him.

He fell into someone's arms, trying to look back where he was previously looking, squirming around in what was surely a painful way for whoever was holding him. 

They turned to let him see what he was trying to see, but nothing was there.

He finally let himself see who held him, He looked up to see bright yellow eyes shining, looking where he was looking. 

“You looked aw-awfully scared, Benry, are you o-okay??” Tommy spoke, still holding him tight in a bridal position. Benry looked at the others, but looked right back to the field when he saw their confused and freaked out faces.

He nodded again, leaning into Tommy’s neck. Stupid fears, stupid weird paranormal stuff… he just wanted to do stuff like this. Especially the part where he gets to lean right up against his warm friends.

Well, caring about warmth and touch wasn’t normal, but it sure was nice.

The conversation seemed to pick back up as he stayed in Tommy’s arms with his face on his shoulder. Tommy didn’t seem to mind at all, though Benry thought he would’ve been tired of it by now.

“Aren’t you getting kinda tired of holding him, man?” Gordon asked Tommy, catching his attention and seemingly reading Benry’s mind. Tommy shook his head.

“No, he’s-he’s very light!” Benry could feel Tommy smile, and accidentally let out some sweet voice. Pink, floating right up past Tommy’s face.

He buried his face deeper. Fuck. 

“Oh, pink! That means-”

“Bbbbbbbbb” Benry interrupted, making what should’ve been an impossible noise without a microphone, but that didn’t stop him.

He heard Gordon laugh a little bit and he made more sweet voice. Fuck sake what was going on??

Benry put his hand to his mouth, knowing it wouldn’t work but he hoped it would anyway. The two people he didn’t know were asking what that was in wonder. 

Tommy tried to explain it to them, though half the stuff he said didn’t entirely make sense. Though to be fair, the sweet voice didn’t really make sense either.

He didn’t like how dumb he felt about it.

He began to sing blue, and heard Tommy laugh a bit.

“That t-tickles a little bit!” He said while laughing.

Benry tried hard to keep with only blue but couldn’t help the pink that snuck in. He pulled his face from its spot and let his head fall backward. He could almost see Gordon from the angle he was at.

He kept making blue, numbing the emotions to dust. They all stood in silence for a few minutes as he did this, the only noise being nature around them and his own singing.

Finally he stopped, taking a massive deep breath. Relief was an understatement everytime he did this and felt the same monotony of emotions he had been so used to. He looked over at the other buildings and wiggled in Tommy’s arms, soon getting put down.

They seemed to pick back up talking behind him, more wonder and questions as he silently wandered over to a two story, a much more intact structure. He just kept walking across the forgotten settlement, no thoughts but a goal. 

Entering the dark building, the only light to see what was inside was the sunlight shining through the broken windows. It was much clearer this house had rooms, and things in those rooms. Disgusting furniture coated in anything the world decided were scattered around.

Wandering through it, he mindlessly began poking thick dust and pushing things off surfaces. He wiped his hand on his dark pants, not daring to ruin his hoodie with it more than usual. He found the stairs and made his way up, the second floor being more of a disaster. Part of the roof was caved and anything under it was subject to the mercy of the destruction.

He found the most empty room, a small one that only had a gross dresser and some other things too covered and torn to decipher. He sat down in the emptiest corner after kicking stuff out of the way.

It felt best not to question the history of this place, he thought as he lit the room with blue.

Blue, blue, blue. Why did this color feel so nice, so at home? Why did it return him to his natural state so well? He’d paint the world in it if it meant he didn’t have to deal with all the emotions he had been. Not caring felt so good. Not thinking felt so good.

He sang his heart out in the room, beginning to form a rainbow in a bubble of blue. Reds holding hands with green and orange hugging purple. So many colors, an abstract painting of his own inner workings. It was pure catharsis.

A creak was almost unheard through the endless notes, as someone entered the space. They gasped, and Benry stopped singing, shrinking in his corner from the unseen intruder.

An arm lightly pushed the colors out of their way, colors now coating their arm like watered down paint. A familiar face followed the arm, many emotions flashing across his face in quick succession. 

“Holy shit dude…” Gordon said, finally standing right in front of Benry, shoving stuff around the floor himself for him to sit. He wasn’t much taller than Benry but it still made him feel oddly small as the other sat in front of him. He accidentally made more blue, gladly fogging his brain.

“Is it like… exhausting to do so much of that?” Gordon asked, gesturing to the colors fading around him, he went to touch one of the recent blues. Benry shook his head.

They sat in silence for a little bit, Gordon clearly trying to think of things to say, but Benry was fine without words. He reached up and messed with the tassels on his hat absentmindedly. 

“You uh… havin’ fun out here man?”

Benry thought for a moment, then nodded, despite feeling like he was lying.

Seeming to suck at taking the hint to be quiet, Gordon continued to speak. “This place is kinda creepy, right? Like these people had to leave almost out of nowhere or something. It feels like stepping into a familiar place I’ve been in before that’s been absolutely ruined by a single mistake...” The last thing he said seemed like it was some familiar experience to him, even though it obviously wasn’t.

“Out in the middle of nowhere, nowhere close to go… just. Gone and abandoned! Vulnerable! It’s so dusty and old, what the fuck happened, y’know?” He paused to laugh forcefully. “Oh man it’s only us too…”

He continued to ramble, it becoming a more and more clear picture that he was having a bit of a time.

“Maybe you should go get some air…” Benry finally spoke, interrupting something about the dark and sharp objects.

Gordon took a moment to process, looking at the other in the darkness.

“Yeah. Yeah! You’re right, yeah. Thank you, I’m going to go get some air. Yes. I’ll be back though!” He stood and walked a bit too fast down the hall, loudly hopping down each step. 

Feeling bad about not trying to help more, Benry sighed and put his knees to his chest, resting his chin on them.

Singing, singing, singing. More colors, the loneliness of the house was a comfort, privacy a near guarantee. Though soon he found he was running out of colors to sing. He stopped sweet voicing into the nothingness and just softly sang instead, considering going back out to the others, or exploring the other houses.

He stood and made his way out of the house, blinking quickly in the sunlight. The others were scattered around the street, exploring as well. Quietly he made his way to what seemed like the most intact of the houses, a one floor.

The first thing he noticed as he made his way inside was how dark it was. It was so intact that there were still curtains on the windows, seemingly doing their job very well. He didn’t bother to open them as he made his way around the place. Aside from obvious looting, it was like nothing really happened aside from dust build up.

He sat down on the bed of the bedroom farthest from the exit, trying his best to shove down any wonder as to what happened, why everything was left behind. Any sunlight that may have lit the room was snuffed mercilessly by the curtains coating the window, the room so dark it felt like the middle of the night.

He used his phone to look around the room from his spot, not much to look at. He decided to just play games instead. 

He couldn’t help but wonder why he was being so boring though. He usually loved stupid things like this, to fuck around and scare the people with him, break shit, find his way to the most dangerous spots to sit around on. But all he wanted right now was to sit in the darkness alone. 

It felt stupid.

Blue. Blue, blue, blue, blue. Blue until it erased the thoughts and the pain eating at him. He was not about to let himself care about it.

Blue and video games. Chilling out in the dark time.

Creak went the house, maybe 5 or so minutes later, as someone entered. Gordon was probably looking for him again.

Step, step. Careful steps…

He was looking around the house, it seemed. Benry just continued playing games while he waited. Only a few more minutes till the steps approached his door, so he shut off his phone screen as it opened. 

His bones seemed to turn to ice within his skin as he looked up.

Those eyes.

That was _not_ Gordon.

Golden and glowing, they approached. A tower cautiously making its way across a field. Benry found he couldn’t move as the other scanned the room, only feet away from him.

They turned to look at him, but avoided his stare.

“A-are you okay, Benry? You’ve been- been hiding away all day.”

If there was any doubt he had of who those eyes belonged to, it was washed away. But his fear was not.

“Benry, you can tell-tell me if something’s wrong! ...Benry?”

It felt like alarm bells were screeching through every inch of his body, he knew he was starting to breathe faster, he could only do his best to keep it silent as he felt he couldn’t do anything else.

Tommy kept saying his name. Tommy, Tommy, Tommy. That voice was definitely Tommy. Was it?

A phone flashlight suddenly illuminated a familiar, sweet face. Glowing eyes erased by a new glow. The light turned and faced him, he blinked for a few seconds till it was moved from his direct view. The glowing eyes already back, piloting the light.

He was definitely a sight in the new light, panicking and curled up in a dusty old corner, near hyperventilating. 

Nothing seemed to happen for a moment, though it felt like a week. He knew he was being stared at right now, but he was looking away. 

He saw movement in the corner of his eye and suddenly his icy bones were pulling him away from the hand reaching for him and out the door, crashing into the walls of the house as he ran to the front door and out, near tripping on the uneven ground.

He only had a moment to process anything as he looked wildly around till he saw the poofy auburn hair of Gordon in the distance, and his legs brought him right into him.

_CRASH._

Gordon clearly wasn’t expecting to get rammed into, cause he nearly fell from the force. Benry was clinging to his side, half the reason they were still standing.

It was clear Gordon was ready to start scolding Benry for the action, but once their balance was fully regained, he noticed the smaller one was shaking. He considered asking what was wrong, but he decided against it.

And so they stood there hugging for a minute. 

It was only when careful steps sounded behind them that Benry was no longer hiding his face in Gordons chest but was now turning them around so he was behind Gordon, watching as Tommy approached.

He couldn’t help it as some sweet voice burst out of him, a deep blue-gray, emphasised by his shaking. Tommy’s already concerned expression seemed to only grow more concerned.

“Benry, why are y-you scared?” He asked as he stopped in front of them. Gordon was now facing Tommy as well, unknowingly acting as a shield for Benry. It was clear the staring was making him uncomfortable, but Benry felt he couldn’t look away. The sunlight left them all looking as normal as ever, but shadows were at the edge of his vision nonetheless.

He looked so pretty in the sunlight, but it wasn’t anything to ease the fear. More sweet voice bubbled its way out of Benry’s mouth into the open air, the same color as before. It seemed his vision just kept getting darker and darker, the focus only being the tall man before him. He almost forgot Gordon was even there.

Well, that was until Gordon was turning around again and moving in front of his view, and gently moving the others face to look at his own.

“Benry…” He began slowly, “What the fuck. Is going on with you right now?”

Benry couldn’t help but stare at him silently, barely processing the words. He was also so pretty…. But the darkness framing his view was still growing, and he felt himself nearly pulling away from his own control.

_No. No no no no no no no NO **NO.**_

He kept internally screaming as he escaped the space around anyone else, and it had seemed the other two that were with them had also come back out to the clearing, staring at him. He held his arms tightly around himself as he looked around the area in a panic. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was even doing, but he felt the need to run.

Another set of arms wrapped tightly around him though, and he found he didn’t feel like fighting them. He also found his name was being spoken in his ear, along with gentle comforting words, bringing him back to reality. He leaned his head into the figure, knowing full well who it was, even if his mind was still catching up with putting a name to a face.

“We’re gonna go home, okay?”

He nodded in relief.

The tense, long drive home was not as relieving an experience, though.


End file.
